Army of Free Farmers
A militant group organized John Van Heller and George Van Tassel in the Kaap region of Saridan. Was determined to prevent industry from spreading to their communities. Founding John Van Heller and George Van Tassel were both authors of political essays. They were radical agrarians and and they called for an armed defense of their way of life. Many farmers answered this call by joining militias organized throughout rural Kaap. Van Heller and Van Tassel officially named the militias the Army of Free Farmer (AFF for short) in January 3841. Leaders of the militias from alll around rural Kaap met to elect a leader of the AFF. Only two canidates were considered, Van Heller and Van Tassel. People gave speeches that endorsed one of the candidates. After four days of speeches from militia leaders, Van Tassel took the stage. His speech was full of emotionally lines and riled up the crowd. However Van Tassel came off as radical when he stated during the speech, "Let the farmers rise and coupe the republic. Let us create a virtuous farmers republic." More moderate militia leaders preferred Van Heller because he was less radical. For this reason Van Heller was elected. Van Heller as the Leader Van Heller quickly organized the group and establishd order in the militias. He created rules of engagement, required due be paid by members, spread the cause to other regions, and negotiated with local politicians. However, Van Heller lost his idealistic belief in a farmers republic, and his views quickly became more moderate. After a year and 5 months as leader officially resigned from his post as leader of the group in May 3842 so that he could pursue a career in politics. Van Tassel as Leader After Van Heller resigned the militia leaders once again met to elect a leader. This time a decision was made after only one hour of deliberation. Van Tassel was unanimously elected. However, by the time he was elected he had severly deradicalized and his ideology had become very moderate. He issued a disarm order in June 3842 after a heated confronataion between a militiaman and a police officer turned violent. The police officer was killed and the AFF man was arrested. Van Tassel's disarm order demanded that all weapons held by the AFF be returned to the stockpile, and officialy stripped the right of an AFF memeber to carry a gun. Dissent among the radical members of the group grew as Van Tassel joined Van Heller in politics and often neglected his duties as leader. In July 3842 Van Tassel resigned from his post as leader and became a full time politician. The Dissolving of the AFF In August 3842 the militia leaders met to elect a new leader. After 15 days of deliberation the group could not agree. The leaders officially decided to dissolve the group due to lack of unity in regards to idealogy and because of the fact that many leaders felt that the group was no longer needed because the Farmers Party would protect the rural communities. Revival In () John Van Cope reorganized former militia leaders from the AFF. He had lost faith in the Farmers Party and felt that they had strayed to far from the ideaology of the Farmers Manifesto and the Farmers Demand. Van Cope called for a revival of the AFF, and the embracing of the radical policies that Van Tassel and Van Heller had once supported. Van Cope recruited many former leaders and the AFF was officially restarted in (). The new militia leaders elected Van Cope as the leader. Van Cope as Leader Van Cope called for strict adherence to what he referred to as the "Paternal documents of the free farmer movement". These two documents were the Farmers Manifesto and the Farmers Demand. Van Cope rejected the Farmers Party policy of embracing and regulating industry. Van Cope called for the eradication of industry. Moderate members of the militia disliked Van Cope's radical views, but the young and up coming members of the AFF backed him. This new group of young leaders, led by Van Cope, led a revival of the radical ideology once boasted by Van Heller and Van Tassel. Van Heller warned in a speech, "Van Cope reminds me a lot of myself, I came to my senses after a while, but I am afraid he wont. A man who does not outgrow these views, a man that grows in power on this radical platform, a man that the world does not turn moderate, is a man that all wise men should fear."